EXCLUSION

Not Drinks, Drugs or Sex

But Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and Special Needs

WHY WE NEED REFORM IN THE INDEPENDENT SCHOOL SECTOR
(because any independent school can exclude a pupil for ‘poor performance’. There are no safe guards and no meaningful recourse for appeal)

Imagine your child is attending a local independent school, imagine that he has been there for five years and is happy and doing well, imagine that although he needs some learning support, he has a good I.Q. and no behavioural problems. Imagine then that suddenly he is asked to leave. What rights do you imagine you have against such a decision made by the school? It many surprise many parents to hear that in the independent sector, the answer is ‘none’.

Recently, there has been much correspondence in the papers about pupils being asked to leave halfway through their ‘A’ level courses for not getting good enough ‘AS’ grades. In many respects their problems are the same as children who require learning support. As schools jockey for positions in the league tables, children who don’t ‘make the grade’ are forced out.

Is there any other service industry where one pays so much (a figure of £200,000 from infant school to ‘A’ levels, wouldn’t be far off) with absolutely no comeback if things go wrong? There are Ombudsmen for everything from the NHS to mortgages, but not in the independent school sector. The school and its governing body have the last word and there is nothing a parent can do about it. Nor do independent schools seem to feel any moral obligation to ‘see a child through’.

This anomaly needs to be addressed and now. We need an impartial body to whom parents (and teachers) can appeal when conflict has arisen and be confident that the dispute will be listened to sympathetically and fairly. It is a disgrace that a time when more and more parents are opting to send their children to independent schools, there is no accountability. And if schools are unwilling or unable to impose it on themselves, then shouldn’t parents, teachers and educationalists bring pressure to do so?